Preface

Berlin

February 22, 1943

The pounding on her apartment door was startling, a rapid and resounding set of booms much more urgent and insistent than a casual drop-by or neighborly visit. It was the type of knock that Gerda Behrendt had been fearing for months, since her brother-in-law had been picked up and shipped off on a transport to the East, since so many of Berlin’s Jews had been herded into deportation centers and expelled to the camps, to fates still unknown at the time. There were rumors, terrible rumors, of what was happening to them.

Hesitating, fearing the worst, Gerda opened the door, and was relieved that it was not the heavy boots and dark uniforms of the SS, nor the long leather coats and black-brimmed hats of the Gestapo. Instead, it was her next-door neighbor Alice Wölm, a Christian, who, risking her own life, nevertheless appeared panicked.

“Gerda,” Alice burst out. “The Gestapo are on the neighboring block, and are rounding up Jews. They are coming this way. They are coming for you.” 

Gerda and her husband Martin had thought long and hard about this moment, but even now it seemed unreal. In an instant, they had the bags ready and were taking last looks around the apartment. With a furtive glance between them and another toward their four-year-old son, Denny, Gerda and Martin affirmed their decision. They would go into hiding, take their chances underground, do anything they could to survive as Jews in the heart of the Nazi homeland. 

With effort Martin ripped the patched yellow stars from their coats, the tell-tale sign of a Jude, and instructed their son not to cry. Gerda took his small hand in hers, and Martin grabbed his walking cane, hoping to move as fast as he could. Rushing down the three flights of stairs and out a back passageway, where the Gestapo might not see them, the Behrendt family hurried off, escaping out into the cold Berlin night. The hunt was on, and their fight for survival was just beginning.